Alaska Department of Military and Veterans Affairs hosts JBER Veterans Day ceremony

Official Statements

• Alaska National Guard, November 12: “The Alaska Department of Military and Veterans Affairs hosted the JBER Veterans Day ceremony. The Alaska Office of Veterans Affairs, military veterans organizations, service members of every branch of service and component, and federal and state civilians pitched in to stage the event that featured Maj. Gen. Torrence Saxe’s last Veterans Day keynote speech as the Alaska adjutant general. Verdie Bowen, Alaska Office of Veterans Affairs director, said DMVA hosts the event to honor and to reach out to Alaska’s many veterans.”

• Alaska National Guard, November 12: “We have 70,000 veterans in the state, and it’s our way of letting them know that we totally appreciate them,” Bowen said. “Fourteen percent of our state is veterans, so we are the highest state per capita in the nation.” Saxe said Veterans Day serves to honor all of today’s living veterans going back to World War II, which sadly represents a shrinking veteran population. He offered a unique word of appreciation for Vietnam War veterans.”

• Alaska National Guard, November 12: “I always make a point to call out in a very respectful way Vietnam veterans because, as many know, maybe their reception wasn’t the best when they came home,” Saxe said. “So, on behalf of all of us, I just want to say ‘Thank you for your service and thank you for what you did, and I appreciate you being here.’” During the ceremony, Alaska Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom joined Bowen to honor Vietnam veteran George Bennett of Sitka with the 2026 Alaska Governor’s Veterans Advocate of the Year Award.”

• Alaska National Guard, November 12: “It was really important to honor him because he has continuously done work for as long as he’s been out of the service,” Bowen said. “He helped us mark 19 unmarked graves in Kake, Alaska.”

• Alaska National Guard, November 12: “He’s helped us with [veterans] stand downs … where we go and we set up services for veterans that normally wouldn’t receive those services … George also helped us set up a mental health system in place in Southeast Alaska, so that those veterans that are unable to fly out can receive those mental health services.”

• Alaska National Guard, November 12: “Saxe said, despite being an Airman, he appreciates the U.S. Army motto, “This we’ll defend.” “It is the best mission statement I’ve ever heard since I have been in the military because it encapsulates what we do, and we can go forward together defending [the homeland] … If you think about the land that you walk on, literally where your kids go to school, this is what we’re defending.” Defending America, Saxe said, is the heritage every service member from the Colonial Era to the modern-day shares.”

• Alaska National Guard, November 12: “There has been an unbroken line going back to 1636 for the National Guard, 1775 for Army,” Saxe said. “And wherever you have been in that continuum, you have been for that period someone who said, ‘I’ve got the watch. This we’ll defend.’”